ERIC and WorldCat Database Searches

One of my class competencies is to find a topic that interests me and use it to come up with a 'naive' question. Using the databases ERIC and WorldCat, I am to research my question and list a citation from each database. My search is documented as follows.

My topic of interest is nonuser studies. Nonuser studies is the evaluation of why certain people are not using a library or a particular library service. Such studies can let the librarian know of any inadequacies that prevent use of library services. (Rubin, 2004, p. 65) Inadequacies may include library aesthetics, organization of material, attitude of staff, or lack of marketing. This leads to my naive question.

Naive Question: What are some of the characteristics of nonuser groups identified by public libraries?

The nonuser studies trend for public libraries concerns me because it has been over a year since I have used the library. Also, I have not used the library for my own personal needs in over ten years. The reason I used it a year ago was to find books to teach my daughter how to read. Once she learned how to read, I began obtaining books for the entire family from the bookstore. Reflecting on this, I buy books because I can afford to, and I like to keep the ones I really like in case I want to read them again. However, I have also wasted money at the bookstore trying out new authors and works that I ended up not liking. It occurred to me that I could have been using the library to try out the new works and then buy them if I wanted to keep them in the long run. Although it is an extra trip to the bookstore, it would be worth the money saved. However, the library usually does not have new releases or as many intriguing displays as the bookstore. It bothers me that I have always wanted to be a librarian but no longer use my local library. Can those who no longer use the library be grouped as having certain characteristics? Are there ways to encourage nonusers to use the library?

ERIC Search:

I first used ERIC to conduct my search. I took my naive question to come up with facets and then used the thesaurus in ERIC to get subject terms for my initial terms. The following summarizes this process.



The last term of “encourage nonusers to use the library” is not in my naive question. It came out of my evaluation of my question. I found that this is what I’m ultimately interested in once I understand who these nonusers are.

The above thesaurus terms are used to form the following search statement.

SS1 subject field search: (use studies OR community study OR library research OR statistical studies) AND (public libraries OR county libraries OR regional libraries) AND (marketing OR publicity OR information dissemination OR communications OR library extension OR public relations OR advertising OR institutional advancement)

RESULT: 102 records

Notes: Many of the results concern academic libraries, research libraries and special libraries that I had to sift through although I specified different types of public libraries. These extra results can be eliminated by revising the search statement to not include these library types.

SS2 subject field search: (use studies OR community study OR library research OR statistical studies) AND (public libraries OR county libraries OR regional libraries) AND (marketing OR publicity OR information dissemination OR communications OR library extension OR public relations OR advertising OR institutional advancement) NOT (academic libraries OR research libraries OR special libraries)

RESULT: 25 records

Citation: Ristau, H. (1988). What're You Readin'? How Junior High Students Choose Their Reading Materials in New Ulm, Minnesota. Illinois Libraries. 70(1), 44-46.


WorldCat Search

The same facets and initial terms were used in WorldCat as in ERIC. However, WorldCat produces different subject terms. The table shows the subject terms found for each facet in WorldCat.



This is a good place to note the subject heading differences between ERIC and WorldCat. WorldCat sometimes produces the same subject headings as ERIC for the broader terms. For example, they both use the subject terms “use studies”, “public libraries”, and “regional libraries”. WorldCat has the tendency to be more specific than ERIC, especially when expanding on a broader subject term. For example, WorldCat gave me more specific results than ERIC when searching for subject terms for “publicity”, such as “reading promotion” and “social service publicity”.

The following is the first search statement for the WorldCat search based on the thesaurus terms for this database.

SS1 subject field search: (library use studies OR use studies) AND (public libraries OR regional libraries OR rural libraries) AND (marketing OR communication in marketing OR publicity OR advertising OR public relations OR promotion of special events OR reading promotion OR social service publicity OR television in publicity)

RESULT: 35 Records

Notes: I could use more results based on the statistics and characteristics of nonusers. The search above gives enough results on the marketing aspect. By removing the subject headings associated with “encourage nonusers to use the library”, the following search statement is formed.

SS2 subject field search: (library use studies OR use studies) AND (public libraries OR regional libraries OR rural libraries)

RESULT: 907 records

Notes: The results are plentiful, so the next search will have to narrow things down a bit. However, I was able to quickly find some good resources that concentrate on statistics.

Citation: Galloway, S. B. B. (1978). The relationship between awareness of the Davis County libraries and their use and nonuse. ERIC reports, ED 179 221. Washington D.C.: Educational Resources Information Center.

References

Rubin, R. (2004). Foundations of library and information science. New York: Neal-Schuman.